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Shepherd Center’s video series exemplifies the best in brand journalism

Editor's note: The following article is from PR Daily's recent special edition featuring the winners of the recent 2012 PR Daily Awards. We will periodically run excerpts from the special edition over the next several months.

It’s hard to fathom suffering a head or spinal injury in the
abstract. In reality, it must be terrifying, and given such exceedingly
trying circumstances, it would certainly be all the more difficult to
grasp the intricacies of such an injury.

Healing, though, must start with some understanding of the
therapeutic processes and objectives. To that end, Shepherd Center in
Atlanta put together a video series to give the injured and their
families and other caregivers digestible information about what has
happened, what’s possible and what’s required. Above all, though, the
series aims to give them hope.

For its sterling efforts, Shepherd Center won top honors in
the Content Marketing/Brand Journalism category in Ragan’s 2012 PR
Daily Awards.

There are many reasons for the laurels awarded this tandem video series; here are a few:

A concerted effort: Shepherd partnered with the American Trauma
Society, the Brain Injury Association of America, the National Spinal
Cord Injury Association, and the Christopher & Dana Reeve
Foundation. On-camera and voice-over contributions came from an array of
experts.

Ease of access: The videos, offered online (see below) and as
free DVDs, are in short segments so the intended audience can assimilate
the content.

Establishing expertise: From a pragmatic standpoint, content
marketing is marketing, and the cornerstone of that is assuming a
position of authority—and delivering. Done, and done.

The success of the videos from a marketing standpoint is
easy to see: 5,000 videos in each category—traumatic head injury and
spinal cord injury—were ordered and the stockpile was depleted within
four months. There are no metrics for the success on the personal level
of those who watched them, learned from them, gained strength from them.

We offer our congratulations to Larry Bowie, Shepherd
Center’s director of public relations and marketing, and to all those
who had a hand in this video series.